Dylan Valley
“I believe that in order to dismantle systems of racial and economic inequity, we need to first imagine what a world free of discrimination might look like. Visual storytelling, particularly through the moving image, is one of the most powerful tools we have at our disposal for imagining a better world, as well as for reckoning with our current shortcomings. ”
Dylan Valley is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and educator who sees film and digital technologies as tools of liberation. Dylan has worked as a commissioning editor at the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) and has directed documentaries for Al Jazeera, SABC and independently. Originally from Cape Town, Dylan is currently an associate lecturer in film and television at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg (Wits). He is also a Ph.D. candidate in the media studies department at Wits, and is a THInK doctoral fellow (Transforming Humanities Through Interdisciplinary Knowledge). His research interests have to do with how the internet is shaping filmmaking today, and the possibilities this opens up for filmmakers and activists, particularly from marginalised communities. Dylan studied film and media at the University of Cape Town, where he made his first documentary, “Lost Prophets,” on the legendary South African hip hop group Prophets of da City. He went on to work in television and directed the documentary “Afrikaaps,” which revisited the history of Afrikaans as a creole language and a language of liberation. Dylan went on to make more documentaries, including “The Uprising of Hangberg,” which documented police brutality during a housing struggle in Hout Bay, Cape Town. In 2013, Dylan received a scholarship to pursue a master’s degree from the University of South California in Los Angeles, where as his thesis project he made a documentary on the groundbreaking web series, “The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl,” by Issa Rae. This experience helped pave the way for the research and teaching he is now doing at Wits. When Dylan is not teaching at Wits, he DJs and is on the editorial board of Pan-African arts, politics and culture blog, Africa is a Country.